Vidarbha is the eastern most region of Maharashtra State in India. For administrative purpose, it has been divided into two divisions, namely Nagpur and Amravati.As per recent census of 2001 there are 15741 revenue villages in the Vidarbha region which consists of 11 districts. Each district has been divided into sub-districts called tahsil or Taluka.

Table No.1 Total and Vanvasi Population of Vidarbha

Division

District

No of Tahsils

No. of Villages

Nagpur

Nagpur

14

1874

Wardha

8

1382

Bhandara

7

778

Gondiya

8

893

Gadchiroli

12

1679

Chandrapur

14

1791

Total of Nagpur Division

6 Districts

63 Tahsils

8397

Amravati

Amravati

14

1996

Akola

7

1009

Washim

6

789

Buldhana

13

1433

Yawatmal

16

2117

Total of Amravati Division

5 Districts

56 Tahsils

7344

Total of Vidarbha

11 Districts

119 Tahsils

15741

The forest area is 37282 sq. Km. and is 38.8% of the geographical area. Major portion of the vanavasi population is residing in the forested area of Vidarbha Region.The distribution of the total population and the vanvasi population as per 2002 census is given in the following table

Table No.2 District-wise total and vanavasi Population and its percentage

District

Villages

Total Population

Vanavasi Population

Percentage

Total

Rural

Urban

Total

Rural

Urban

Total

Rural

Urban

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

Nagpur

1874

4067637

1453886

2613751

444441

217752

226699

Wardha

1382

1236736

911695

325041

154415

132766

21649

Bhandara

778

1136143

960418

175728

175728

84740

12978

8.6

8.82

7.38

Gondia

893

1200707

1057276

143431

196455

189358

6097

16.36

18.0

4.25

Gadchiroli

1679

970294

851672

42468

364256

358775

5481

Chandrapur

1791

2071101

1405034

655067

389587

333298

56289

18.1

22.7

7.4

Amravati

1996

2607157

1707578

898879

356493

222622

34011

Akola

1009

1630239

1002742

627497

100088

85540

14548

6.1

8.5

2.3

Washim

789

1020216

841771

178445

70987

67797

3190

7.0

8.1

1.8

Buldhana

1433

2232480

1759097

473383

115156

105935

9221

5.2

6.0

1.9

Yavatmal

2117

2458271

2001060

457211

473370

31971

31971

19.3

22.1

7.0

Grand Total

15741

20630981

13952229

6590901

2840976

1830554

422134

Out of total 15741 villages, the Government has recognized 4244 villages as tribal or vanavasi villages under Tribal subplan area (TSPA), Additional Tribal Sub-plan area ( ATSPA), Modified Area Devalopment Area (MADA) and Mini MADA. Out of 4244 villages the number of villages having population is 3586. The district wise break up is given in the following table

The total no recognized vanvasi vllages in different categories of tribal area are 4241.Out of these villages ,655 villages are uninhabitated.

Table No.3 Distribution of the populated recognized Vanavasi Villages in different Tribal areas

If we classify these tahsils and vanavasi villages according to percentage of the vanavasi population of all the villages with respect to the total population it will be seen that majority of the villages are in those tahsils where the percentage of vanvasi population is 20% or more. This is clearly indicated in the following table No 4

Table No.4 Classification of districts according to percentage of the vanavasi population in recognjsed vanavasi villages as per 2001 census

District

TSPA

ATSPA

MADA

Mini MADA

Total

Nagpur

29

214

24

267

Wardha

29

46

75

Bhandara

47

47

Gondiya

100

201

301

Gadchiroli

1228

39

1267

Chandrapur

165

296

102

14

577

Total NGP. Div.

1393

464

593

84

2534

Amravati

320

59

21

400

Akola

48

48

Washim

19

10

29

Buldhana

29

11

40

Yavatmal

276

111

127

21

535

Total AMR. Div

596

111

282

63

1052

Vidarbha Total

1989

575

875

147

3586

From Table No. 4 It is observed that 3324 Villages out of 3586 are having population more than 20 % 0f theVanavasi population i.e. 92.7% are covered in 55 Tahsils only.

Tahsils not recognized but having Sizable percentage of Vanavasi population

There are Tahsils having sizable percentage of Vanavasi population but the villages have not been recognized in any type of tribal area. Such tahsils are mentioned below